Following that shoot-down as Russian rescue helicopters searched for the pilots of that airplane, at least one of the helicopters was destroyed by U.S.-backed Syrian rebels using a CIA-provided TOW anti-tank missile.
The rebel group posted video of the destruction of the Russian helicopter...As part of the CIA program, Syrian rebel groups receiving U.S. TOW missiles are required to video each use and return each spent container.
The potential repercussions of these two incidents today could be unprecedented. The first is that the U.S. may get drawn into an armed confrontation with Russia if Turkey should invoke Article 5 of the NATO Treaty. In a speech following the plane shoot-down, Vladimir Putin said that measures will be taken against Turkey for their actions.
The second is that solid evidence of U.S. weapons being used against the Russians operating in Syria could be the pretext for direct confrontation between the U.S. and Russia.
And as I've reported here at PJ Media previously, the TOW missiles provided to "vetted moderate" Syrian rebel groups have repeatedly found their way into the hands of terrorists.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.